I celebrate a rather strange anniversary today.  For those of us who celebrate this particular anniversary, it is as much an anniversary, as it is a remembrance.   A remembrance of what my life was like when I was grasping for what could be done, and what I had lost to get to that point.  You see, 2 years ago today I had a portion of my brain removed–yes rather shocking if you didn’t already know that about me.  My Medical Journey had left me with only one good option at that point.  Today is the two year anniversary of my right temporal lobectomy, the two year anniversary of the day I did the only thing I could do get my life back, the one shot I had at being seizure free.

Now at the two year anniversary I remain, as always, confident that I will reach that day, the day I will be seizure free.  No, still not there yet, but I will be.  How can I be confident in that fact when the best of medicine has so far failed me?  Because it is not medicine I am counting on to make that happen.  There is a promise I look forward to being fulfilled more then any other promise that has ever been made to me.  That promise is found in 1 Corinthians 15, that promise, that I will be changed from Perishable to The Imperishable.  That as I now bear the likeness of the man from earth, I will bear the likeness of the man from heaven (1 Cor 15:49), that I will one day be like Christ.  On that day my body will no longer be physical, no longer be perishing, and I will be seizure free.  On that day this anniversary will no longer be significant, because I will be with my God, the one has proven Himself faithful to me in every way.

If you spent a significant amount of time with someone and 1/3 of the time you spent with them they were sick, hurting, having surgery, recovering from surgery, having seizures, recovering from seizures, being diagnosed for yet more odd symptoms, or just plain having a bad day because they were tired of feeling like that all of time, how would you react to that?

Seems like an odd question I know-but tomorrow my husband and I celebrate 12 years of marriage, and for 1/3 of that time that is exactly what my husband has dealt with and his reaction to it has amazed me.  It was 4 years ago that I started to get sick, and in this last 4 years my husband has never wavered in his commitment to me, he has never told me he had enough, he has never gotten angry because of our situation, and he has never once allowed what is happening to shake his firm belief that the Lord is faithful to us.  1/3 of our marriage I have been sick, and not just with a cold!  1/3 of our marriage I have been just about 1/3 useful!  Yet my husband has still been 100% committed to what he said when he stood with me 12 years ago and told me “for better for worse in sickness and in health till death do us part”.  We have had our sickness and our worse.  I’m not saying we won’t have more, what I am saying is I know my husband won’t waver if and when it comes again.

So tomorrow when we celebrate our 12th anniversary I will thank the Lord for Mike, and for giving me just the right husband for me.  I will thank the Lord for giving me a man who didn’t just utter words on our wedding day, but who made a commitment to both me and the Lord to stand by what those words meant.  It may be true that 1/3 of the time we have had together has been in sickness and the worse, but because it was with the Lord, and because Mike stood by his commitment to me, the burden of it was light.